Trying to find an answer, Sean suddenly jumped to what he first thought of. "My way of training is... Uh... I guess just make sure I hit? I've never actually trained at swordplay itself, usually avoiding enemy attacks and identifying weakspots..." Sean's mind suddenly started to go blank. "I guess this could be a good time to get some swordplay experience," he explained as he looked around for any signs of a dummy or target. "So do we just hit trees, or...?"
"Personally, I start with stance. It isn't the same as what you're probably thinking of, 'cause we have to imagine our enemy. I mean, we could go to a training hall in the city to use dummies, but normally, I find using my old kendo practices for inspiration pretty helpful." Adjusting her sword to hold it like she'd held her earlier weapons in childhood, the elf took a careful stance, wrists angled so her sword was at a diagonal, before she raised her arms over her head, took a step and struck the air before her. She called out as she did so, moving back to her first position each time, the swing never changing, her eyes clearly focused on a single point before her. "It's all about visualizing the target, and aiming for a specific spot. For me, I'm aiming for a head right now. Most of my moves use kendo as a base personally, but I know some other kinds from watching movies too."
"Ah, so that's how you do it..." Sean seemed intrigued at the idea of not actually hitting anything. "I'll try it out." He took a stance, his left shoulder out in front and his sword lowered yet ready. "Let's do this!" He yelled, suddenly spinning around in circles with his sword extended, probably meaning to do some sort of tornado-ish technique, before stopping with a wobble and repeating.
Watching his wobbling, she dropped her sword and rushed to grab his shoulder. "Hey, hey, wait a second! Don't just rush into the heavy duty attacks! You gotta get the basics down first!" Feeling for his feet to be steady, she let go of him, remembering earlier she'd already made him uneasy with her tendency to invade personal space. "You were making me dizzy just watching. I have an attack like that, but it takes a lot of energy because the movement method is just kind of...rough. I hate using it for that reason. If you're worried about mobs like before, why don't we go for a wide swing instead of a spinning one?"
"A wide swing, huh? Sounds like it'd be good for crowd control," Sean perked up as he took his stance. "So, I've seen this technique used in some of my games before," he explained, performing two wide slashes before leaping into the air and landing with a third. "How is it?"
Her hands moved to clap as she watched him, his movements much less forced than before in her mind. "That's the way! Well done!" She too a stance and opted to show him one of her own methods, holding her katana in one hand and towards the opposite side, before letting out a swift burst of energy into the air as it sliced past the still breeze. "You shouldn't worry too much about how it looks. Start by focusing on technique, so that you learn to memorize the pattern of movement. It's good to act in the moment, but having a backbone for the skill makes it so you can use it even in the heat of battle without really having to think about it, y'know?"
"So, a battle isn't all about your strategy... Got it!" Sean exclaimed, before getting into position for some more slashing. "I always focus solely on how I'm going to approach the situation so much that I forget completely about my own sword techniques." He proceeded to start slashing vertically up repeatedly. "How do you feel about using upward slashes to knock the enemy off their feet?"
"I've never tried it, actually. Don't think I learned a technique quite like that." Giggling a bit, she watched him. Now, the one who'd been giving input was getting some new ideas! She tried to mimic him, but the movement of slashing upward rather than with a downward strike was a bit awkward to her arms. Laughing, she grinned his direction. "Apparently just watching isn't enough to learn it. Mind giving me some pointers? I've never tried going up instead of down, and my arms just really don't get the movement, I think. Muscle memory can be a good and a bad thing I guess in it's own way!"
"I'm not that good of a teacher, but I'll try." Sean started to sound a bit uneasy about himself. "So I'm pretty sure this is extremely difficult with two-handed weapons, but if you're using a one-handed weapon, you start by flipping your weapon around to hold it like a dagger." He demonstrated by holding his sword completely backwards. "You then just move your arm up extremely quickly," he explained, suddenly performing a quick upward slice. "You think you can do it with those tips?"
"Hm..." She tried to do it based on his tips, and at least got somewhat similar- but, her sword was a bit long and caught itself in the dirt because her arms weren't quite right in the angling of the move. A soft sigh left her lips as she found it took a moment to get out of the tiny nick in the ground. "So...um...Maybe I should stick to kendo? I want to learn this skill, but it might be that my sword is the wrong kind for it. Katana are pretty long and all...Or I might just be holding it wrong since I'm not used to daggers anymore."
"Maybe you should try a diagonal up slash. That works with katanas," Sean proclaimed. "You basically perform an upward slash, but start at the left/right and work to the other side while slashing." Sean demonstrated the movement, jumping into the air to carry the momentum before falling face-first on the ground. "Ow... I'm okay." He gave a thumbs up as he got back up.
Giggling a bit as he tried to play off his fall, the young woman wandered to his side to pat his back. As her hand made contact, she gave some energy into a minor healing spell- it was better to take care of wounds when they appeared after all! "So a diagonal slash, huh? That does look a bit easier...Let me try that now. Take a good look so you can tell me where to adjust, okay?" She moved away so she wouldn't hit him before trying the same slash, but at an angle. Because she wasn't swinging downward towards the ground first this time, she didn't get caught in dirt and found herself swinging as far across as she could. Unable to stop the momentum, her swing went over her shoulder a bit, though she never lost grip of her blade. "Er...Where do you usually stop? I feel like I'm swinging a baseball bat instead, just backwards."
"I usually stop once the blade gets to shoulder to ear height." Sean provided a visual representation of the blade's height. "If you can learn to control the momentum, that could get you out of some situations." He paused for a second. "If you can't stop the blade, just move with it. Maybe you'll be able to chain the slash with something else," he explained. "Let me show you an example." He performed a diagonal slash, jumping into the air before landing with a vertical downward slash.
"So use the whiplash to my advantage, kind of?" She mused, trying to comprehend what she'd just seen. She didn't opt to jump as she attempted it- instead, she let the blade go from her hip to her shoulder and made a horizontal strike with the bounce back, surprised as she found it easily reaching her other shoulder, and almost felt able to make another cut in the air. "Woah! It's like the amount of force I needed going upward actually made more energy go into it!"
"To me, it looks like it's as if your blade is becoming an extension of your arm..." Sean exclaimed in minor bewilderment. "Such movements would surely devastate an enemy if used correctly..." He pondered for a moment. "But hey, I just started playing, what can I say?" He went back to practicing his slashes, focusing more on two-hit combo moves.
